AuthorTopic: I'm in! January 2008 at Marshall. Winter in Chicago was never so sweet! (Read 15776 times)

Second try and the only application for winter 08.I received the letter in the mail today. Unlike the last one, it was a little thicker.I will be entering law school in January! I can't wait. This is truly an amazing day for me. I'm 32, I returned to complete my undergrad just a few years ago and have been working at a job I wasn't terribly happy with for almost 3 years.After getting dinged at every school I applied to for fall, I was pretty bummed. I decided to turn around my app right away for Marshall. I called to verify that everything was complete and the admissions lady told me that I was in the first batch to go in for review. Furthermore, she noted that mine was the first application they had received.Crazy!I'm in!And I don't think I could be happier.I really can't wait...

i am happy for you because all of us can relate to getting into that school that you really wanted.

however, please please PLEASE make sure you realistically know what your job options will be like when you enter there. i am from the area and i know many dissatisfied john marshall students.

as you must know, or eventually will find out, the entire legal institution is heavily rooted in elitism. and john marshall is very very low on the totem pole.

i wont rehash all the basic args that are all over this board. if you're resourceful enough to post here, then you're resourceful enough to have done the research.

sorry for the buzzkill, but don't get too excited about going there, and do NOT go there unless you have identified a plan in which attending john marshall actually gives you a decent shot at doing what you want afterwards.

otherwise -- and this is very solid advice for you -- wait a year, retake the LSAT's and get into depaul, kent, or loyola. that might seem like a huge setback, but i know many many many 2L's and 3L's there that would gladly push things back a year instead of being there.

think of it this way - push things back a year now, or flounder for many years after graduation. i'd retake the LSAT and go somewhere else.

Congrats to you, especially given the determination you've shown by going back to school. I finished my undergrad in my late twenties as well. But germane to this thread is the fact that I, too, was dinged by (almost) every school to which I applied - except for JMLS.

You have every reason to be excited about your acceptance. 20% of IL judges attended JMLS, including two of the current seven on the IL Supreme Court. There are partners who attended JMLS at every prestigious big firm in the city, many JMLS alumni have started their own successful firms, and others are doing everything in between. The professors at JMLS, at least for the first year courses, are excellent, and provide a very practical (and often "bar-oriented") legal education.

The top 10% of your class will be comprised of smart, extremely hard-working students, who will eventually get great (biglaw, or top government) jobs (the top 5% sooner; the next 5% might take a while). The next 10% (i.e. top 20%) down will be fairly smart, pretty hard-working students, who will eventually get decent (midlaw, or midling government) jobs. The bottom 80% (not all, but most) will be a rather unimpressive bunch, and I really have no idea what they end up doing for a living.

I jumped ship after my 1L year at JMLS for a top 30 school and summered at at V30 firm, to which I will return after graduation. However, please know that I was very lucky. Everyone starting law school assumes they'll be at the top - but most are profoundly disappointed. Hell, I was only in the top 15% after 1L at JMLS; I know people who were higher ranked than me who chose not to transfer out, and do not have a post-graduation job lined up.

Now is the time to seriously ponder what it will be like to take on more than $100k of debt. I have two bits of advice:

1) Do your very best in your first semester (of course, this advice applies to any law student). If you rank very high (i.e. no lower than top 10%), appeal to the school for a generous (or increased) scholarship. Whether or not they agree to give it to you (they offered me an extra $1,000 per semester to stay!), you will have a serious choice to make: to transfer or not to transfer. I would strongly recommend UIUC, if you are able (that's not where I go). It will cost you a lot less, and give you vastly better opportunities than Loyola, Kent or DePaul. (For that matter, don't even consider DePaul - it's only marginally better than JMLS for job prospects.) I don't know if Northwestern takes transfers after only one semester, but in any event, you would need to be the top student in your class to have a shot.

2) I firmly believe that JMLS is superior to Northern IL University (the other school that admitted me on the first go around). However, given its low cost, you might want to give NIU some serious thought.

Again, congrats. Don't let people online get you down about attending a Tier 4 school. You are going to a law school, you will graduate and pass the bar, and become a lawyer. Just don't lose sight of the fact that you will be paying at least $1,000 per month on your student loans after graduation, a burden which only the top 10% of JMLS grads (speaking optimistically) will be able to shoulder with ease. Best of luck.

Listen up, zipperhead.I'm not interested in you badmouthing JMLS.Nor am I interested in hearing you tell me that I can't work in big law.If you ask me, getting into a law school is just fine. Passing the bar is even better. Seriously, nothing pisses me off more than when people start trashing other people over what school they went to.Talk about elitism.I WANTED to go to JMLS. I realize to an elitist yahoo, that doesn't make sense. Yes, close to 20% of all Illinois judges went to JMLS. I guess they aren't good enough for you. I know someone who is a sr. partner of a highly successful law firm that focuses on divorce. She went to JMLS. That firm actively seeks JMLS students to clerk and then become associates. Starting pay there is $85,000 a year. That's not peanuts.As for my job possibilities? Well, please don't let me stop you from figuring my life out for me, but I can tell you that I have more going for me than you may think. When I graduate and pass the bar, I have a job waiting for me.I shouldn't get "too excited" to go there?Blow me.I should wait another year and retake the LSAT? Yeah. Great advice. Why start law school when I can wait it out another 6 months just so I can go to a law school with a better rep.Great advice. I wouldn't want a 6 month jumpstart on anyone who might follow that stupid advice. That would give me, you know, 6 months or so of real world work experience.Let me get this straight - in your feeble brain, it is better to sit out a year, retake the LSAT, and then start somewhere than it is to go where I wanted to go, work hard, graduate in the top 10% of my class, clerk for judges along the way, and pass the bar first time. Yeah.Great advice.Fortunately for me, I'm not some young prick who thinks my opinion matters to other people when it comes to their life plans.If I could give you some humble advice from my own kitty-Don't be a male private part when giving advice. JMLS is not a bad school. Law school is what you make of it. My plans might be different than yours. I might have advantages that you don't, like say a father who runs his own mid-size firm and works alongside my brother, a lawyer for the last 8 years that makes around $170,000 a year and is a full partner. I might be well connected with judges, partners in large law firms, managing attorneys at large law firms and the like. I might just be more connected than that. Perhaps I was part of a fairly influential family with long time area roots who has his pick of jobs as long as he passes the bar exam. You just don't know now, do you?Take your unwanted and counterproductive advice and shove it up your irritating little rear end.People like you are exactly the reason I didn't want to attend law school in the first place. Smug, condescending, arrogant - great qualities for someone who hopes to pass the bar one day. My life experience has taught me that when people like you talk, they are just trying to make themselves feel better than other people.Good for you. Enjoy your soulless big law. In 10 years, when I'm happy and you have already given up on practicing law, we should talk again about how your notions of self-worth are greatly misplaced.

Thanks for the advice, putz.I'll be just fine.Go crap on someone else's dream. Perhaps you should spend more time bashing the folks who decided to go to Cooley? That would make you feel better, no?

i am happy for you because all of us can relate to getting into that school that you really wanted.

however, please please PLEASE make sure you realistically know what your job options will be like when you enter there. i am from the area and i know many dissatisfied john marshall students.

as you must know, or eventually will find out, the entire legal institution is heavily rooted in elitism. and john marshall is very very low on the totem pole.

i wont rehash all the basic args that are all over this board. if you're resourceful enough to post here, then you're resourceful enough to have done the research.

sorry for the buzzkill, but don't get too excited about going there, and do NOT go there unless you have identified a plan in which attending john marshall actually gives you a decent shot at doing what you want afterwards.

otherwise -- and this is very solid advice for you -- wait a year, retake the LSAT's and get into depaul, kent, or loyola. that might seem like a huge setback, but i know many many many 2L's and 3L's there that would gladly push things back a year instead of being there.

think of it this way - push things back a year now, or flounder for many years after graduation. i'd retake the LSAT and go somewhere else.

Thank you. I appreciate your post as it is far less insulting than the other pricks who think they get to have a say.To be honest with you, I've done pretty well for myself. I'm 32. Law school is paid for. So the cost is not an issue. The way I see it, I'm $100k ahead of everyone else. Worst case scenario, I'm in the hole for $20k or so, tops.This is not a big deal by any stretch.As for gigs afterwards, I'm not worried about that either.I know attorneys who have flat out told me that when I pass the bar, they'll hire me. If I want to specialize in something else, they'll help me get where I need to go.This is not an issue. I am not the typical law school student, as I have attorneys in the family and have developed a network of some fantastic lawyers who do very well for themselves.I don't plan on leaving JMLS. I do plan on working hard, learning what I can, making loads of friends, and passing the bar.Everything after that is all part of the adventure and, to be honest, I couldn't be more excited to see what comes of it.Best of luck to you.

Congrats to you, especially given the determination you've shown by going back to school. I finished my undergrad in my late twenties as well. But germane to this thread is the fact that I, too, was dinged by (almost) every school to which I applied - except for JMLS.

You have every reason to be excited about your acceptance. 20% of IL judges attended JMLS, including two of the current seven on the IL Supreme Court. There are partners who attended JMLS at every prestigious big firm in the city, many JMLS alumni have started their own successful firms, and others are doing everything in between. The professors at JMLS, at least for the first year courses, are excellent, and provide a very practical (and often "bar-oriented") legal education.

The top 10% of your class will be comprised of smart, extremely hard-working students, who will eventually get great (biglaw, or top government) jobs (the top 5% sooner; the next 5% might take a while). The next 10% (i.e. top 20%) down will be fairly smart, pretty hard-working students, who will eventually get decent (midlaw, or midling government) jobs. The bottom 80% (not all, but most) will be a rather unimpressive bunch, and I really have no idea what they end up doing for a living.

I jumped ship after my 1L year at JMLS for a top 30 school and summered at at V30 firm, to which I will return after graduation. However, please know that I was very lucky. Everyone starting law school assumes they'll be at the top - but most are profoundly disappointed. Hell, I was only in the top 15% after 1L at JMLS; I know people who were higher ranked than me who chose not to transfer out, and do not have a post-graduation job lined up.

Now is the time to seriously ponder what it will be like to take on more than $100k of debt. I have two bits of advice:

1) Do your very best in your first semester (of course, this advice applies to any law student). If you rank very high (i.e. no lower than top 10%), appeal to the school for a generous (or increased) scholarship. Whether or not they agree to give it to you (they offered me an extra $1,000 per semester to stay!), you will have a serious choice to make: to transfer or not to transfer. I would strongly recommend UIUC, if you are able (that's not where I go). It will cost you a lot less, and give you vastly better opportunities than Loyola, Kent or DePaul. (For that matter, don't even consider DePaul - it's only marginally better than JMLS for job prospects.) I don't know if Northwestern takes transfers after only one semester, but in any event, you would need to be the top student in your class to have a shot.

2) I firmly believe that JMLS is superior to Northern IL University (the other school that admitted me on the first go around). However, given its low cost, you might want to give NIU some serious thought.

Again, congrats. Don't let people online get you down about attending a Tier 4 school. You are going to a law school, you will graduate and pass the bar, and become a lawyer. Just don't lose sight of the fact that you will be paying at least $1,000 per month on your student loans after graduation, a burden which only the top 10% of JMLS grads (speaking optimistically) will be able to shoulder with ease. Best of luck.

The thing you fail to realize is that all law schools are not created equal. Law school is not solely "what you make of it." Rather, the quality of your classmates and professors will dictate much of the quality of your education, and quality of education should be paramount in your search, regardless of where or what you want to practice.

Listen up, zipperhead.I'm not interested in you badmouthing JMLS.Nor am I interested in hearing you tell me that I can't work in big law.If you ask me, getting into a law school is just fine. Passing the bar is even better. Seriously, nothing pisses me off more than when people start trashing other people over what school they went to.Talk about elitism.I WANTED to go to JMLS. I realize to an elitist yahoo, that doesn't make sense. Yes, close to 20% of all Illinois judges went to JMLS. I guess they aren't good enough for you. I know someone who is a sr. partner of a highly successful law firm that focuses on divorce. She went to JMLS. That firm actively seeks JMLS students to clerk and then become associates. Starting pay there is $85,000 a year. That's not peanuts.As for my job possibilities? Well, please don't let me stop you from figuring my life out for me, but I can tell you that I have more going for me than you may think. When I graduate and pass the bar, I have a job waiting for me.I shouldn't get "too excited" to go there?Blow me.I should wait another year and retake the LSAT? Yeah. Great advice. Why start law school when I can wait it out another 6 months just so I can go to a law school with a better rep.Great advice. I wouldn't want a 6 month jumpstart on anyone who might follow that stupid advice. That would give me, you know, 6 months or so of real world work experience.Let me get this straight - in your feeble brain, it is better to sit out a year, retake the LSAT, and then start somewhere than it is to go where I wanted to go, work hard, graduate in the top 10% of my class, clerk for judges along the way, and pass the bar first time. Yeah.Great advice.Fortunately for me, I'm not some young prick who thinks my opinion matters to other people when it comes to their life plans.If I could give you some humble advice from my own kitty-Don't be a male private part when giving advice. JMLS is not a bad school. Law school is what you make of it. My plans might be different than yours. I might have advantages that you don't, like say a father who runs his own mid-size firm and works alongside my brother, a lawyer for the last 8 years that makes around $170,000 a year and is a full partner. I might be well connected with judges, partners in large law firms, managing attorneys at large law firms and the like. I might just be more connected than that. Perhaps I was part of a fairly influential family with long time area roots who has his pick of jobs as long as he passes the bar exam. You just don't know now, do you?Take your unwanted and counterproductive advice and shove it up your irritating little rear end.People like you are exactly the reason I didn't want to attend law school in the first place. Smug, condescending, arrogant - great qualities for someone who hopes to pass the bar one day. My life experience has taught me that when people like you talk, they are just trying to make themselves feel better than other people.Good for you. Enjoy your soulless big law. In 10 years, when I'm happy and you have already given up on practicing law, we should talk again about how your notions of self-worth are greatly misplaced.

Thanks for the advice, putz.I'll be just fine.Go crap on someone else's dream. Perhaps you should spend more time bashing the folks who decided to go to Cooley? That would make you feel better, no?